2. Blackwater Park
3. Deliverence
4. tie: Morningrise & Orchid
6. Still Life
7. Watershed
It's very close from 2-7.
8. Damnation
9. Ghost Reveries
8 & 9 aren't in the same ballpark at all. I love "Window Pane" & "In My Time of Need", but the rest of Damnation is pretty forgettable for me. And I actually enjoyed Ghost Reveries when it first came out, but it has not held up well at all for me. I find myself with no desire to revisit it anymore.
One thing I've found is that there really isn't such a thing as a casual Opeth fan. This thread cements that.
We all view the band in a different light; each have our own favourite albums. Some love Ghost Reveries, others can't stand it. Some don't know what the band was smoking when they made Watershed, others have it in our top 5. Some find Morningrise shrill and monotonous, others epic and ambitious.
Originally Posted by moogoob /img/forum/go_quote.gif One thing I've found is that there really isn't such a thing as a casual Opeth fan. This thread cements that.
We all view the band in a different light; each have our own favourite albums. Some love Ghost Reveries, others can't stand it. Some don't know what the band was smoking when they made Watershed, others have it in our top 5. Some find Morningrise shrill and monotonous, others epic and ambitious.
And that is why I love Opeth: there are so many ways to interpret their music and directions they took. Even though I miss their early to mid years, I still know that each album will have a least a couple of killer songs.
Orchid is another beast it's own way. When I hear it it reminds me of early In Flames or At The Gates almost. Maybe even Dissection! OK so it's the first album. Some people love it the most and others put it at the end of the list. Just that being a fact is totally cool to me. I don't care if the LP ends up sounding thin because all music from that time is that way. Not necro like Darkthrone but thin. Maybe it's all about mood or I'm a fan...... but Orchid is really cool. There are a couple of parts that seem a little at a loss for a solid direction almost as if it was recorded in a hurry. That we don't see in later releases. Sometimes this RAW sound is neat. Why do we have people put Orchid at the end of their list? All the output of Opeth is great. Maybe it really does not matter if one album is better than another. Someday we may love our least liked album choice as our most loved first. Or maybe not!
Update....
For anyone who cares, the Back On Black 2008 release on Orchid sounds really good. Yes it has the sound from the time, but that sound is cool. For a record that was recorded in March of 94 it sounds fresh. The best way for me to understand Orchid is one word......Bathory........Bathory........Bathory... .OK, that"s been there all along, I just somehow got caught up in all the bands sounds from that time and forgot the Guy/Band who created it. Now I will try and hear where Bathory is in all of Opeths work. I'm sure it must be ingrained. In the 70s we used to say "duh".
For anyone who may get it, hearing Orchid in LP form is nice. There are a lot of breaks with guitar that sound best on LP. The 180 gram violet disks are stunning as well as the art. The sound got bigger on later Opeth releases but I can't help but feel Orchid IS in a realm all it's own. There is a vibe that this album puts out. Playing an LP keeps you from skipping forward like we somtimes tend to do. If the music is good, there is no need to not let the LP play on.
Just finished listening to Watershed ( on double vinyl and ripped to 24/96 flac )...i'd say it's one of those records i don't remember a single riff after a firts listen...at a second one they usually turn out to be either so complex to require even a third, or so shallow and repetitive there's nothing worth remembering...i'll wait to judge this album and put it in my top ten.
Just one word on the infamous "melodic singing over blast beats" part at the beginning of The Lotus Eater, it sounds quite good but i hope it won't spawn a new metal genre based entirely on this new technique
What was neat about some issues of Watershed is the LP came with a cd. You could have both. When I first heard Watershed it was a sonic overload. The music is so big a person is not able alot of the time to remember or hear riffs. It's almost like an opera in that it takes repeated listening. Opeth is so deep sometimes. Alot of other peoples reviews of Watershed here are a little negitive. They could in time cause me to rereview it and it may fall lower on my list. The vocals are so dam good though. I'm glad Gost Reveries is at the bottom of my list, something has to be at the bottom right? I gave it another chance today. I like it but somehow I get tired of it. Orchid is one that I like more and more. We are so lucky to have this much musical output from a rock band!
I gave Watershed a relisten, i have to say it's pretty good overall ( just to put it into perspective, even my least favoutite Opeth record is at least 7/10 ) however it has its flaws, songs are starting to get shorter, Orchid has four over 11 minutes, and there is some filler material on the record.
Heir Apparent, Lotus Eater and Hessian Peel have some great riffs even if Opeth's standard rythm changes are a bit too abrupt and not so well introduced and sustained as in Bwp, due also to reduced song lenght.
Out of the lesser tracks Burden is quite interesting as Mike's clean vocals sound better than ever on this one...but Hex Omega or Coil were not anything special...
Production is one of the other pieces of evidence they went for a slightly more commercial release: Mikael's growls are a bit too "digitally processed" and sound somewhat smoothed out to make them more tolerable to a wider audience...i mean just compare the sound with Orchid
There his vocals were almost black metal screams...
I still can't agree with those fans already considering the record selling out, remember two band members have just changed...i expect something better on the next album, this one is already quite good.
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